Customer Reviews

Sony Webbie MHS-PM1 HD Camcorder (Silver)

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

I currently own a Flip Mino HD and was looking for something with a bit more features. I bought this because of its expandable memory and removable battery. I didn't want to be limited to the Flip's 60 min shooting time and 2 hour battery life. The unique swivel lens is pretty awesome! It made turning the camera on and off really easy and shooting video at all angles also easy -- especially if you're taking self videos, just turn the lens on yourself! Taking 5MP photos is a plus. You don't have to bring an extra digital camera!

With that said, I ultimately returned the camera. The features over the Flip are really great, but I was pretty disappointed in the video quality compared to the Flip. Low light video is not great -- indoor and night shooting was pretty dark. I know there's a video setting for low light, but that didn't really help the quality much. It picks up audio really well but if you swivel the lens you can hear it, and it also picks up wind easily. I mostly take snowboarding video, and do a lot of indoor and night shooting. Also, the digital zoom is choppy. If video quality is important, may I suggest searching for video samples/tests/comparisons. If you will mainly be using this outdoors during the day, this might be for you.

This is the only mini HD video camera on the market at present with a rotating head and that's the reason I use it. If you don't need the rotating head, there are better mini cams on the market and I recommend you seek them out.

I knocked off a star because during continuous recording, you have to re-press the record button every 25 minutes - that's the max clip length. Non of the other so called drawbacks concerned me: no on-board battery charging, slightly soft 1080i, the fact that you need to buy a memory card, lousy low light recording, etc etc etc. It is what it is folks - a fairly inexpensive high definition recorder.

For all you hobbyists out there, I've been using this for about a month now and I've got to say, for the price it's a keeper. I've attached it to an rc helicopter and sent it up a couple of hundred feet, strapped it to the handlebars of a bike and velrco'd it to the bill of my baseball hat. In each of these situations, the rotating head allows the lense to be pointed correctly regardless of mounting constraints.

The camera has no image stabilization (not unusual for a mini) so I shoot in "sports" mode which gives a little faster shutter speed (no good for indoors, though) and then run it through the anti-shake filter (set on low) in Cyberlink Power Director 7. I shoot in 720P mode and the quality is somewhere between dvd and blue ray when played back on a decent set.

Hope that helps you make up your mind!

This camera is basically the original Sony Webbie HD (MHS-CM1) camera shaped into a candy-bar format to more directly compete with the Flip Mino HD. In doing so you lose the optical zoom and the LED light. If you discount comments about the optical zoom (including complaints about motor noise) and the usefulness of the LED light, the rest of the features are pretty much the same and you can use the reviews for the original Webbie HD. I knew going in that this would be mainly an outdoor-only camera, but thats exactly what I wanted a smaller second camera for. I have a Canon HV20 HDV camera for indoor and more demanding use, but wanted something similar to a Flip to keep in my pocket when doing activities outside (walking the dogs, going to a bar-b-que, etc. where I am not consciously thinking of taping the event but something comes up that is worth capturing) that has a removable battery and flash memory. I've either been at work or the weather has been grey since getting this so I can't put it through its paces where it will really shine, but have taken some indoor 720p footage and stills. Enough to verify the camera is natively supported in iLife '09 (iMovie and iPhoto) and that other's comments about it being kind of weak in low light and when panning shots around are right. It isn't totally unusable, but you can see a yellowing of footage that can be compensated somewhat through iMovie or iPhoto in dark shots and you have to pan slower than even what is needed when using a consumer full-sized HD camera. Would I sell my Canon HDV camera and use only this? no. Will I keep this for on the spot captures in settings that match up to its strengths? yes.

I bought this camera on Amazon after my local camera store said that they sold 10 of them in one week. I didn't get to see the quality of the picture and sound. Had I been able to do that, I would not have purchased the camera. In terms of portability, the camera is great and I give it 5 stars. It's a little larger than my cell phone. In terms of the quality of the video image and sound - it's a completely different story. Granted, it doesn't cost 10 times as much as you'd be paying for a good HDV camera, but it was a big disappointment to see the image and hear the awful sound. I get better quality video and sound on my Sony V3 and Nikon P5100 cameras - both are not "HD size" (they're 640 x 480) but what's the point of getting an extremely poor quality HD video? I returned the Webbie for a refund.

Initially attracted to this device for its unique, swiveling lens (great for taping secretively), I became increasingly aware that I had bought the wrong handheld-HD-camcorder. The two major faults: a 25-min video recording limit (after 25 mins, recording stops and you have to press record again), and the fact that the memory card used by this camcorder is significantly more expensive compared to SDHC cards (for 16GB card: $100 versus $30 for SDHC).

Search YouTube for sample videos of the Aiptek GVS and buy that instead if you want a cheaper alternative that has many of the same features and more, but without the two aforementioned faults.

We bought this mini video camera to take little short snippets of videos. We have a baby on the way and our dog is comical so we wanted to share some of our moments in the next year or so with our family and friends.

The Sony Webbie lets us do just that. We can take some small movies and send them through e-mail as .wmv files. The software we use on Windows Vista converts the format from .mp4 to the .wmv for smaller more compressed videos.

The camera works really well. It's easy to do videos or still pictures. There is no light source or flash for the camera part but the camera does a pretty good job picking up light in the area. While the videos are pretty good, this is not made to be a professional video camera. The pictures can be dark in a dark room. There is no motion reducer on the camera and zooming is manual. That being said, it does a good job for what it is.

I would recommend this mini video camera but I did take off one star on the review because of the memory card. When you buy the camera, it comes with only internal memory which is a joke. I think it only let's you take about a 2 minute video if that. Make sure you buy a memory card with it. It's essential to use it. They don't tell you that and in my opinion Sony should of given us more memory or a basic card. It's a hidden cost but memory cards aren't that much.

Hope my review helped!!

I had been waiting for a sub-compact HD camcorder for a couple of years and had been considering purchasing a Kodak since it could pull off 720p, but I decided to wait when I heard that Sony was coming out with a 1080 offering. Note that this is not true 1080p, but for the price, you really can't beat this camera. Another thing to note is that this device will record 720p in wide screen, but not for 1080. Also, as you might have guessed, this camera isn't great at handling anything at night.

All in all, I've been very impressed with this camera. I went in looking for a sub-compact HD video recorder and found what I wanted. The swivel lens and rechargeable (and more importantly, REPLACEABLE) battery was icing on the cake.

I recently took the Webbie with me to shoot interviews on the fly at a convention I went to. It was so easy to use and the videos in SD mode were good. Audio was surprisingly good too! I would go back to the newsroom each day, connect to the web via usb and upload to tubemogul.

On the HD side the videos I show of my son in the backyard were excellent. All this and it fits in my pocket like a big pack of gum. Oh and the swivel head is a great feature too.

Other plus's for me were the long battery life and the ability to use the Pro Duo cards. 16GB in mine.

I recommend this for anyone who wants to shoot video on the fly!

i have the candy bar shaped webbie so i can pretty much have a camera in my pocket at all times...yes it is what it is...yet i've been amazed at how nice the footage is...i don't expect much quality indoors and would rarely use it indoors...i have a few expensive prosumer hd cameras that are not great indoors either...hd needs more light of course...but all the outdoor footage has been a bit of a jaw dropper...and the files just drag right into vegas or final cut no prob...sure not for everyone but for the price i would think the quality is better than the flip hd and others like it...plus the webbie has a few more controls...webbie takes stills...3 shooting modes...1080-720-and standard def...swivel lens...

I bought this from Amazon a couple of weeks ago for the features and small footprint compared to alternative pocket camcorders. I've owned several camcorders and a LOT of other photo equipment and was realistic in my expectations for the Sony Candy Bar. I won't reiterate the other reviews - they are pretty accurate.

However...there are three big disappointments I have:

= No external mic input (this I knew going in.)

= Completely unusable LCD screen on a sunny beach. Most are terrible, but this one is completely useless. I live right on the beach, so this is a bigger deal to me than it will be for most.

= The worst thing is that Sony has hard clamped the record time to a max of 25 minutes! This is irrespective of whether battery or A/C adapter is used.

This last limitation is not disclosed anywhere in the manual - or any other Sony propaganda. While this is probably not a limitation for most, I do time lapse movies of sunsets over the Gulf of Mexico, etc. and this means I can't just set and forget it.

Why constrain users this way? And, if you are going to do it, disclose it. Caveat Emptor if this may be a deal-killer for you and your intended use of this Sony MHS-PM1.